And more importantly, chief marketers are confident that they can meet management's revenue and market share goals for the coming year.

A surprising 81% of the 525 global marketers surveyed by the CMO Council believe management mandates for top-line revenue growth and market share are realistic and attainable in 2014. However, only 26% report they are halfway toward achieving these goals. The encouraging outlook from the world's top marketers includes a number of important indicators, among them: Some 55% plan headcount additions compared to 22% who expect reductions. 54% of marketers expect budget increases, and 27% believe their budgets will stay the same. Just 10% of marketing leaders polled believe their jobs are at risk or on the line this year. 75% of senior marketers received a salary increase or bonus in the past year, and 83% believe this will happen in the next fiscal year if they perform well. 69% say they are trusted strategic members of the C-suite and/or increasing their stature and credibility with key business leaders.

In-depth and valuable

The "State of Marketing" study, sponsored by NetBase and Infor, provides an in-depth view of global marketing vitality and direction. The benchmark report serves as a valuable resource and reference for the CMO Council's 7,000 members in 110 countries, who collectively control more than $400bn in aggregated annual marketing expenditures.

The report, based on a 50-point assessment concluded during the first quarter of 2014, is an invaluable, peer-inspired marketing planning tool to help calibrate, prioritise and make a business case for marketing investments. It is widely regarded as the most rigorous and comprehensive report of its kind in the marketing sector, aggregating global and regional views on the following: Marketing challenges, accomplishments and organisational priorities Global and regional marketing dynamics and intentions Transformation plans and marketing technology investments Allocation of marketing and media spend and budgeting Organisational development and talent sourcing Agency turnover and performance measurement Compensation and professional development goals

Giving marketing more weight in strategic decision-making

"A big benefit to marketers is the growing level of collaboration and interaction with functional heads and line-of-business leaders," notes Donovan Neale-May, Executive Director of the CMO Council. "This is giving marketing more weight in strategic decision-making and also ensuring organisational alignment around the customer experience given marketing's increasing ownership of customer data and insight."

Some 30% of survey participants say today's CMO is equal to other C-level peers while another 45% feel that this is only sometimes the case. Only 20% believe that the CMO is not equal to other C-level decision-makers in terms of status and influence.

While 63% of marketers rate the contributions of their agency partners as extremely valuable or pretty good, 66% are planning to make one or more changes to their agency roster in 2014. Lack of business results, value-added thinking and uninspired creative top the list of reasons for these changes.

The complete report is available to download at for $199, and a complementary executive summary of the report and accompanying infographic can be sourced as well.

CMO Council premium content subscribers ($495 annually) can download the full report at no cost.

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